Satellite maker Clyde Space secures new orders worth almost £2.2m

The Glasgow-based company, which designed and manufactured the UKube-1 satellite, has also almost trebled its manufacturing and design space with a move to the new 10,000 sq ft bespoke premises in Finnieston business campus

Scottish satellite manufacturer Clyde Space is reporting its “best year to date” with turnover doubling to £2 million and securing new orders worth almost £2.2 million.

Clyde Space, the manufacturer of Scotland's first satellite UKube-1, has also almost trebled its manufacturing and design space with a move to the new 10,000 sq ft bespoke premises in Finnieston business campus.

The company, which currently employs 34 staff, said it has won a new contract worth £1.2 million to provide power systems for Europe’s third largest European space company, Luxembourg-based Lux Space for two satellites Lux is building for the European Space Agency.

Clyde Space has also secured a contract worth £0.94 million sub-contractor contract with US-based Spire Inc which Clyde Space said builds upon the success of that relationship and has led to it becoming Spire’s biggest sub-contractor.

The company said the new premises will provide room to increase headcount to 40.

Clyde Space founder and chief executive, Craig Clark, said: “We’ve had our best year to date and we expect next year’s results to show a further step change in revenue and profit.

“Our growth is due to the investment we made in product development over the last few years starting to pay off as our market continues to expand.

“Our market has grown at an average of 40 per cent per year for the last five years and this is set to continue.”

He added: “We’re growing pretty fast just now and have literally run out of space for new recruits, so our move to our new premises can’t come soon enough.

“Our office move is not only desk space, we are significantly expanding our manufacturing facility to give us more room for assembly and test as we prepare ourselves for greater volumes of product sales.”

Clyde Space, a leading producer of small satellite, nanosatellite and CubeSat systems, is currently producing the most advanced CubeSat ever built for the Belgian Institute for Space Aeronomy for its Picasso project.

The Institute specialises in the physics and chemistry of the atmosphere of the earth and other planets and outer space.

Clyde Space had also designed and built Scotland’s first satellite, UKube-1, which was launched from Baikonur Cosmodrome, Kazakhstan, in July.

Clark said: “Our first satellite, UKube-1, allowed us not only to prove a bunch of new technologies in space, it also puts us on the map as a proven spacecraft provider not just in the UK, but globally.

“We’re building on this experience and success to deliver even more capable spacecraft.

“I’m also really pleased to be winning more business from the European Space Agency (ESA) as this indicates that we have matured into an established European spacecraft manufacturer and we are aiming to increase our activities with ESA over the coming years.”